Accidental Arcs: 8 Power Line Failures on Video

Power line failures are quite the thing to behold. Join me as we witness a few very impressive ones.

Let's face it, even the most reserved and sophisticated of us will drop what we're doing and run to look if we hear an explosion or that loud zap we know means that high voltage has escaped the confines of its transmission lines. The allure of that plasma arc is just too strong to resist. Unfortunately, or possibly fortunately, we aren't often in the right place at the right time to witness the magnificent arcs first hand.

Today, I'd like for you just to give in and indulge yourself in some mindless entertainment. Allow yourself to gawk at these power line failures, guilt free. A word of warning before you begin: many of these videos include cussing. I have avoided any videos that show anyone getting hurt, so you have no need to worry about that.

See? That felt good didn't it? Continue on to the next page to see more -- you know you want to.

I wonder if it's feasible in this day and age to run high voltage DC underground (to offset capacitive losses that would be higher) and then convert to lower voltage AC where it's needed? It would help reduce arc over events due to ice & trees etc. or downed poles due to vehicle accidents. I wonder what the leakage and conversion losses would look like in comparison?

Yes, I live in Oz and all new estates now have underground power (have for 20 years now) but the gut feeling I have is that if the whole city grid was underground that the capacitive load would be horrendous. We often have power outages in summer because when the government privatised the power distribution maintenance and infrastructure planning (forward thinking) died.